Richard Rolle
Richard Rolle of Hampole (?1290-1349) was an English poet, religious writer, and Bible translator, who lived as a hermit. Life Overview Rolle, born at Thornton, Yorkshire, was at Oxford. Impressed by the uncertainty and the snares of life he decided to become a hermit, a resolution which he carried out with somewhat romantic circumstances. He wrote various religious treatises in Latin and English, turned the Psalms into English verse, and composed a poem – The Pricke of Conscience – in 7 books, in which is shown the attitude of protest which was rising against certain Papal pretensions and doctrines.John William Cousin, "Rolle, Richard," A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London: Dent / New York: Dutton, 1910, 320. Wikisource, Web, Feb. 23, 2018. He is known as Richard Rolle of Hampole or de Hampole, since after years of wandering he settled in Hampole, Yorkshire, near the Cistercian nunnery. Youth Rolle was born orn into a small farming family, about 1290, at Thornton in Yorkshire (probably Thornton-le-Street), was the son of William Rolle of Thornton in Richmondshire, and was sent by his parents to school at an early age, where he showed such good promise that Thomas de Neville, archdeacon of Durham, sent him to Oxford, paying all the charges of his education. There he is said to have made rapid progress in his studies, but, being moved with a strong desire to devote himself to a religious life, at the age of 19 he left the university and returned to his home.DNB 1897, 49, 164. Hermitage Richard's ambition was not to enter any of the recognised communities of monks and friars, but to become a hermit and give himself up to contemplation. His mode of making his profession was to construct for himself a costume from 2 of his sister's kirtles, one white, the other grey, which she lent to him, and having borrowed also his father's rain-hood, he took up his abode in a wood near his father's house. His family naturally looked upon him as out of his senses. Richard, therefore, fearing that he would be put under restraint, fled from his home and commenced a wandering life. The laity were cautious of him, and he found it difficult to approach women, who thought ill of his intentions.Maynard Smith, 344-345 Entering a certain church at Dalton, near Rotherham, to pay his devotions on the eve of the Assumption, he was recognized by the sons of John de Dalton, the squire of the place, who had known him at Oxford. The next day, the festival of the Assumption, he appeared again in church, and, putting on a surplice, took part in the service. At the mass he went, with the priest's permission, into the pulpit and preached with wonderful power. John de Dalton, having conversed with him, and satisfied himself as to his sanity, offered to provide him with a fitting cell, hermit's clothing, and the necessaries of life. This Richard accepted, and, establishing himself near his patron at Dalton, devoted himself to contemplation and devotional writings. The Legenda represent him as becoming completely ecstatic, living in a spiritual world, and having many conflicts with devils, in all of which he is victorious. In his De Incendio Amoris he describes in detail the steps by which he reached the highest point of divine rapture: the process occupied 4 years and 3 months. Richard soon began to move from place to place, and in the course of his wanderings came to Anderby in Richmondshire, where was the cell of an anchoress, Dame Margaret Kyrkby, between whom and Richard there had long existed a holy love. Here he procured the miraculous recovery of the recluse from a violent seizure. 2 years and 8 months after becoming a hermit, Rolle had his first mystical experience. Around a year later, he felt similarly after listening to a choir, and he began to take less interest in all things temporal.Maynard Smith, p. 345 Rolle then made his way to Sorbonne, which specialised at the time in Bibilical exegesis and pastoral theology, feeling that his attendance at the university was not inconsistent with his lifestyle. In fact, Rolle's time in Paris proved to be of great value in his life, much of which was taken up by contemplation, as he acquired an adeptness in theology.Maynard Smith, p. 346 On the contemplative life, he wrote, "There are many active men better than some contemplatives", though, "the best contemplatives are better than the best actives".Maynard Smith, p. 354 Rolle may have been ordained as a priest in his time at Sorbonne. In the years after, he spent much of his time on the moors of Richmondshire, exposing himself to a harsh climate, and in the process strengthening his communion with God and his discipline in his conduct. Although he was still met with hostility from the clergy, and he conceded that he was awkward with men, he became acquainted with some parish priests, and William Stokes, a Doctor of Divinity, during this time.Maynard Smith, p. 347 Subsequently he established himself at Hampole, near Doncaster, in the neighbourhood of the Cistercian nunnery of St. Mary, which was founded there by William de Clairefai in 1170 for 14 or 15 nuns. He wrote The Form of Living and his English Psalter for a nun there, Margaret Kirkby (who later took up a similar life to Rolle, as an anchoress), and Ego Dormio for a nun at Yedingham. Rolle died in 1349, the first year that the Black Death came to England, and it may have been the cause of his death. Here the fame of his sanctity and his learning became very great, bringing numerous visitors to his cell, and here he died on 29 Sept. 1349. An "office," consisting of prayers and hymns, together with a series of legends adapted to the canonical hours and the mass, was drawn up in anticipation of his canonisation, which did not take place. The legends there preserved are the chief source of Richard's biography. The "office" is printed in the York Breviary (Surtees Soc. vol. ii. app. v.), and from the Thornton MS. in Lincoln Cathedral Library, by Canon Perry in his edition of Rolle's ‘English Prose Treatises’ (1866).DNB 1897, 49, 165. Writing Rolle represented a revolt against many of the conventional views of religion in his day. He was a voluminous writer of devotional treatises or paraphrases of scripture. In his literary work he exalted the contemplative life, denounced vice and worldliness, and indulged in much mystical rhapsodizing. But he was by no means wholly unpractical in his methods of seeking to rouse in his countrymen an active religious sense. He addressed them frequently in their own language. As a translator of portions of the bible into English — the Psalms, extracts from Job and Jeremiah — he deserves some of the fame subsequently acquired by Wiclif. While he was well read in patristic literature, he had no sympathies with the subtleties of the schoolmen; and when commenting on scripture avoided any mere scholastic interpretation, although he often digressed into mysticism of an original type. His popularity was so great that in after times "evil men of Lollardry," as they are described in the rhyming preface to his version of the Psalms, endeavoured to tamper with his writings, with the view of putting forth his authority for their views. Therefore the nuns of the Hampole convent kept genuine copies in "chain bonds" at their house. ''The Pricks of Conscience'' Rolle's chief English work long remained in manuscript. It is the religious poem called the Pricke of Conscience. This, he tells us, was written in English for the instruction of those who knew no Latin. John Lydgate in his Bochas (f. 217 b) mentions how — : In perfit living, which passeth poysie, : Richard hermite, contemplative of sentence, " Drough in Englishe ‘the prick of conscience.’ Rolle's poem consists of a prologue and 7 books, treating respectively of the beginning of man's life, the unstableness of this world, death and why death is to be dreaded, purgatory, doomsday, the pains of hell, and the joys of heaven. Human nature is treated as contemptible, and asceticism is powerfully enjoined on the reader. The style is vigorous; the versification is rough. It is written throughout in rhyming couplets, the syllables of each verse varying in number from 8 to 12, although never more than 4 are accented. The lines reach a total of 9,624. Rolle quotes freely from the scriptures and the fathers, and shows himself acquainted with Innocent III's De Contemptu Mundi; Bartholomew Glanville's De Proprietatibus Rerum; the Compendium Theologicæ Veritatis; and the Elucidarium of Honorius Augustodunensis. In title and subject, although not in treatment, the work resembles the English prose treatise, the Ayenbite of Inwyt ("Remorse of Conscience"), which Dan Michel of Northgate translated in 1340 into the Kentish dialect from the French (Le Somme des Vices et des Vertus, written by Frère Lorens in 1279). Rolle's poem was freely quoted by Warton in his History of English Poetry, and by Joseph Brooks Yates in Archæologia, 1820, xix. 314–34. The whole was 1st printed, in the Northumbrian dialect in which it was 1st written, from the Cottonian MS. Galba E. ix. by Rev. Richard Morris for the Philological Society in 1863.DNB 1897, 49, 166. Manuscripts abound, not only of the original Northumbrian, which was modified and altered in endless particulars by southern English copyists, but of translations into Latin. The latter bear the title of Stimulus Conscientiæ. There are 18 English manuscripts in the British Museum; collations of all these were published at Berlin in 1888 in a German dissertation by Dr. Percy Andreæ. Dr. Bülbring of Groningen has printed collations of 13 other manuscripts, at Trinity College, Dublin, in Lichfield Cathedral Library, Sion College, London, Lambeth Palace, Cambridge University Library (Ee, 4, 35), Bodleian Library (Ashmole, 60), and elsewhere (cf. Transactions of the Philological Society, 1889–90; Englische Studien, vol. xxiii. 1896; Herrig's Archiv, vol. lxxxvi. 390–2). 5 manuscripts of the Pricke of Conscience are in the Cambridge University Library, and at least 12 are in the Bodleian Library at Oxford. English Psalms Of hardly less interest than the Pricke of Conscience is Rolle's English paraphrase of the Psalms and Canticles. The work was 1st fully printed at the Clarendon Press in 1884 from a manuscript at University College, Oxford. This manuscript preserves Rolle's Northumbrian dialect, but is imperfect. The editor (Rev. H.R. Bramley) has supplied the defects partly from a copy at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and partly from one in the Bodleian Library. An imperfect Northumbrian manuscript is in the church of St. Nicholas, Newcastle-on-Tyne (cf. Notes and Queries, 5th ser. i. 41–42). Dr. Adam Clarke, the biblical commentator, owned a manuscript copy, and in his own work often quoted Rolle's commentary with approval (Lewis, History of the Translations of the Bible, 1739, pp. 12–16). A copy at Trinity College, Dublin, is in course of printing by the Early English Text Society. Miscellaneous Rolle wrote in both Latin and English. His English works were written in a vigorous Northumbrian dialect, but they won immediate popularity all over England, and his dialectical peculiarities were modified or wholly removed in the numerous copies made in southern England. Many of his Latin works he himself or his disciples translated into English. With regard to the treatises which exist in both Latin and English versions, it is often difficult to determine for which version Rolle was personally responsible. 2 of Rolle's Latin ethical treatises, De Emendatione Vitæ and De Incendio Amoris, seem best known in English translations made by Richard Misyn in 1434 and 1435 respectively. The English versions have been published by the Early English Text Society (1896). A great part of his literary remains is still unpublished. Manuscripts of his works are numerous in all public libraries: 54 are in the Bodleian Library, 49 are in the British Museum, and 44 in the Cambridge University Library. Of his English paraphrases of scriptures only those of the Psalms have been printed. His rendering of Job in English verse, entitled The IX lessons of the diryge whych Job made in hys trybulacyon … clepyd Pety Job, remains in Harl. MS. 1706 (art. 5) — a volume containing many other of Rolle's tracts. An English verse paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer, assigned by Ritson to Rolle, is in Harl. MS. 435. Of Rolle's English works, 2 prose treatises were printed by Wynkyn de Worde in a single volume in 1506, 4to: Rycharde Rolle Hermyte of Hampull in his contemplacyons of the drede and loue of God with other dyuerse tytles as it sheweth in his table, and The remedy ayenst the troubles of temptacyons (Brit. Mus.). The latter was also reissued by Wynkyn de Worde in 1508, 4to (an imperfect copy on vellum is in the British Museum); and again by Wynkyn de Worde in 1519, 4to (the copy of this edition in the British Museum is perfect, and is said to be unique). 10 English prose treatises by Rolle found in Robert Thornton's manuscript (dated about 1440) in the Lincoln Cathedral Library were edited for the Early English Text Society by Canon Perry in 1866. Thornton lived near Hampole; he ascribes 7 of the treatises to "Richard Hermite," and the rest are assigned to Rolle on good internal evidence. The subjects of the treatises are respectively Of the Vertuz of the Haly Name of Ihesu; A Tale that Rycherde Hermet made; De in-perfecta contricione; Moralia Ricardi Heremite de Natura Apis; A Notabil Tretys off the Ten Comandementys; Of the Gyftes of the Haly Gaste; Of the Delyte and Yernyng of Gode; Of the Anehede of Godd with Mannys Saule; Active and Contemplative Life; and the Virtue of our Lord's Passion. Carl Horstmann published in 1895–6 in his Richard Rolle and his Followers, "The Form of Perfect Living" (prose), many short poems and epistles (from Cambr. Univ. MS. v. 64), as well as "Meditations on the Passion" (prose) from Cambridge Addit. MS. 3042, and other pieces from British Museum MS. Arundel 507. Of Rolle's Latin works there was published at Paris in 1510, as an appendix to Speculum Spiritualium, his "De Emendatione Vitæ" or "Peccatoris," a short religious tract. In the same place and year appeared in a separate volume Rolle's Explanationes Notabiles, a commentary on the book of Job, in Latin prose. The latter is in part a translation from Rolle's "Pety Job" (in Harl. MS. 1706, art. 5). The "De Emendatione"' was reissued at Antwerp in 1533, together with "De Incendio Amoris" and "Eulogium Nominis Iesu." Later reissues, with various additions of other Latin treatises (including Rolle's English paraphrases of the Psalms, Job, and Jeremiah turned into Latin), appeared at Cologne in 1535, and again in 1536, when the volume was entitled D. Richardi Pampolitani Anglosaxonis Eremitæ, viri in diuinis scripturis ac veteri illa solidaque Theologia eruditissimi, in Psalterium Davidicum, atque alia quædam sacræ Scripturæ monumenta compendiosa, justaque pia enarratio. The Latin tracts, with the exception of the commentaries on scripture, were reprinted at Paris in 1618, and again in tom. xxvi. pp. 609 et sqq. of the ‘Bibliotheca Patrum Maxima’ at Lyons in 1677. Recognition Veneration Rolle's grave at Hampole was visited by the faithful for many years after his death, and miracles—chiefly of healing—were reported to be worked there; 20 Jan. was the day traditionally assigned to his commemoration. Rolle is honored in the Church of England on January 20 and in the Episcopal Church (USA) together with Walter Hilton and Margery Kempe, on September 28. Publications *''English Prose Treatises of Richard Rolle of Hampole''. (edited by George Perry). 1866) *''The Form of Perfect Living and other prose treatises'' (edited by Geraldine Emma Hodgson). London: T. Baker, 1910.The Form of Perfect Living and other prose treatises (1910), Internet Archive, Web, July 27, 2012. *''English Writings of Richard Rolle Hermit of Hampole'' (edited by Hope Emily Allen). 1931. *''Richard Rolle: Uncollected Prose and Verse with related Northern text'' (edited by Ralph Hanna) for the Early English Text Society 2007 See also * List of British poets References * . Wikisource, Web, Feb. 23, 2018. * Notes External links * Rolle, Richard de Hampole Category:1290 births Category:1349 deaths Category:14th-century English people Category:Alumni of the University of Oxford Category:Anglican saints Category:British hermits Category:Christian mystics Category:English religious writers Category:English Roman Catholics Category:English theologians Category:University of Paris alumni Category:People from North Yorkshire Category:14th-century poets Category:English poets Category:English-language poets Category:Latin-language poets Category:Poets